Cause and effect mapping for failure mode effect analysis creation and risk management

ABSTRACT

Disclosed are methods and computer-readable instructions for capturing and reporting information for a failure mode effects analysis. One method includes populating and generating a cause and effect map via a graphical user interface, the cause and effect map having a plurality of events interconnected with one or more propagation lines and of the plurality of events being associated with one or more potential failures of a component or subsystem of a system, performing a failure mode effects analysis (FMEA) on the cause and effect map, graphically depicting the cause and effect map to reflect risk based on the FMEA, and visually distinguishing at least one of the plurality of events.

BACKGROUND

The present disclosure relates generally to failure mode effectsanalysis and, more particularly, to techniques for capturing andreporting information for a failure mode effects analysis.

A failure mode effects analysis (FMEA) is used in various industries asa method to facilitate the capture of areas of concerns for a system andapplying risk assessment. An FMEA typically examines potential failuremodes and potential causes of an overall system, subsystems and/orcomponents. Risk assessment is applied to each failure mode by means ofrating its severity, likelihood of occurrence and ability for detection.Doing such allows operators to prioritize risks and activities, and tomake necessary or appropriate design modifications at the system orcomponent level to improve overall system performance and reduce risk offailure.

Conventional FMEA techniques generally require users to enter data intodifferent columns of an FMEA spreadsheet (in paper form orelectronically) or other text-based hierarchy format. In all thesecases, the FMEA process of capturing risk information into standardizedworksheet formats requires participants to follow the procedure offilling in predefined fields. Although effective facilitators canimprove the flow of gathering information from participants to entryinto the FMEA spreadsheet, the current methods available remains largelytext based and often requires participants to tune into the FMEAdiscipline mode. The text-busy and structured nature of the conventionalFMEA continue to be a challenge for all facilitators to engageparticipants for effective results and require extensive time, and thuscost, to a company.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The following figures are included to illustrate certain aspects of thepresent disclosure, and should not be viewed as exclusive embodiments.The subject matter disclosed is capable of considerable modifications,alterations, combinations, and equivalents in form and function, as willoccur to those skilled in the art and having the benefit of thisdisclosure.

FIG. 1 illustrates a graphical representation of a cause and effect mapfor a failure mode effects analysis (FMEA), according to one or moreembodiments.

FIGS. 2A and 2B illustrate visually distinguishing risk in a cause andeffect maps, according to one or more embodiments.

FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary graphical user interface for receivingand displaying information related to a causal event block of a causeand effect map, according to one or more embodiments.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart depicting a method of creating and updating agraphical representation of a cause and effect map, according to one ormore embodiments.

FIGS. 5A and 5B illustrate a related cause and effect map and FMEAworksheet, respectively, according to one or more embodiments.

FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram of an exemplary computer system in whichprinciples of the present disclosure may be implemented, according toone or more embodiments.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The present disclosure relates generally to failure mode effectsanalysis and, more particularly, to techniques for capturing andreporting information for a failure mode effects analysis.

A failure mode effects analysis (FMEA) is used in various industries asa method to facilitate the capture of areas of concerns for a system orproject while applying risk assessment. An FMEA typically examinespotential causes of a component defect or failure, and the likelihood ofthat defect or failure occurring. As a system may fail due to underlyingcauses of sub-components or subsystems, an FMEA allows analysis of theoverall system to determine where failure may originate and what affector severity a component failure may have on the overall system. Theresults of an FMEA may then be used by engineers or operators to makeany necessary design modifications at the system or component level toimprove overall system performance and reduce future risk of failure.

The FMEA information is typically stored in the form of a computerizedspreadsheet or method displaying individual failure modes of the system,subsystem or components on a line-by-line basis. This form of visualdata representation is largely text-busy and makes it very hard for theengineer to see the overall system, and further to track faults throughsubsystems in order to determine the point of fault origination. Assuch, immense time is typically necessary for a thorough FMEA analysis.

The present disclosure includes methods of generating and displaying acause and effect map, which reduces FMEA analysis time by allowingdirect visual representation of failure modes and its associated risksof the system, subsystem and components, all in one map. A visual causeand effect map engages participants by displaying selected FMEAinformation in a hierarchical tree-like structure, representing a map ofcausal events that ultimately lead to undesirable consequences. Thelogical top down nature of a cause and effect map allows for a simplerapplication of the FMEA risk management, for example, by allowing riskassessment to multiple levels of details that would otherwise normallyrequire separate conventional FMEAs and repeated risk assessmentactivity, thus saving time and expense. The method may also allowprogressive distillation of causes to lower level events based on risk.In this approach, operators may choose to stop at a system level causalevent if the risk at that event is determined as low, while expanding tolower level causes for causal events with higher risks, thus savingcost.

While display of FMEA information in the form of cause and effectdiagrams may be known in the art as a fishbone diagram (or Ishikawadiagram), these typically require either a spreadsheet or database tobuild the cause and effect map. Further, they do not allow for directuser interaction, and do not automatically update to visually representa new FMEA and failure analysis. The present disclosure provides methodsto generate, update, and display the cause and effect map in ways thatwill save time and money. One of skill in the art will recognize thatsuch visual representation will prove to be more efficient and effectivethan the typical FMEA analysis method of filling in a spreadsheet or afixed hierarchy system in a meeting, and then being constrained by theconventional column-by-column and line-by-line approach.

Referring to FIG. 1, illustrated is an exemplary cause and effect map100 for an exemplary FMEA, according to one or more embodiments. Thephrase “cause and effect map” may also be known in the art as a “faulttree” or “fault map,” and therefore such terms may be usedinterchangeably herein. As illustrated, the cause and effect map 100identifies a plurality of failure events 102 (“events”), shown in FIG. 1as events 150, 120, 130, 140, 122, 124, 126, 122 a, and 122 b.

An event 102 represents one or more causes of failure (a “causal” event)for a system, subsystem, or component (e.g., a screw breaking orbecoming unscrewed). Each event 102 may be visually connected to one ormore other events 102, thereby forming a cause-and-effect relationshipbetween such interconnected events 102. Thus, one or more events 102will be the “cause” or “causal event,” and a second event 102 will bethe “effect” event 102 resulting from such cause. The propagation ofrisk information between causal and effect events is visually displayedvia propagation lines 104 a-c. Where multiple causes may lead to asingle effect, the propagating risks may merge upon an input location,such as at input 106, or may be put through a weighted calculation, suchas displayed by risk calculation 110. An event may also be programmed to“override” a particular propagation line 104 a-c, such as embodied byoverride indicator 108.

Each event 102 may contain information relating to a component orsubsystem, such as a severity ranking (i.e., how severely a failure maydamage upper level systems), a detection ranking (i.e., how well afailure may be detected), an occurrence ranking (i.e., how often afailure may occur), a criticality number, and/or a risk priority number(RPN). As will be discussed below with reference to FIG. 3, thisinformation may be input by a user via one or more graphical userinterfaces. One exemplary method for calculating the criticality numberof an event 102 may be multiplying the event severity ranking by theevent occurrence ranking. One exemplary method for calculating the RPNof an event 102 may be multiplication of the severity ranking,occurrence ranking, and detection ranking of the event 102.

In the illustrated example of FIG. 1, events 122 a and 122 b representcomponents at the lowest level of the hierarchical system. Failures ofevents 122 a or 122 b will propagate through the system and may create afailure effect of event 150, where event 150 represents the highestlevel of the system. Thus, each of causes 120, 130 and 140 may representa high-level subsystem including multiple components at progressivelylower levels of complexity. Further, cause 120 itself may be an effectof causes 122, 124 and 126 at a lower level of the hierarchy representedby visual map 100.

Each propagation line 104 a-c represents the risk priority number (RPN)flowing from a “causal” event, and propagating to an “effect” event. Forexample, event 122 a may represent a causal event, where the RPN ofevent 122 a is propagated via propagation line 104 a to the “effect”event 122. In other words, event 122 a may cause or otherwise result inthe failure at event 120. This cause and effect connect also makesreadily apparent that an event 102 may be an “effect” event but, inturn, may also be a “cause” event. For example, while event 122 may bean effect event from failure of event 122 a, event 122 may also be acausal event leading to event 120. Visual differences of propagationlines 104 a-c are discussed further below.

When multiple events 102 are used in combination to form a subsystem,this may be reflected by their respective propagation lines merging,such as seen with 104 a and 104 b merging into input 106 of the effectevent 122. As such, the effect event 122 must handle the possiblecombined risks of events 122 a,b. In one embodiment, a particular event102 may retain the highest risk and discard or disregard all otherrisks, as the highest risk will be what the engineers are most concernedabout solving or preventing. In another embodiment, such as visualizedby risk calculation 110, a weighted formula may be used to select whichrisk passes through. The weighted formula may implement calculationsknown or used by one of skill in the art for fault tree analysis,including use of conditional algorithms based on information propagatedto risk calculation 110 from input events, such as event 122, 124, or126.

As previously discussed, each event 102 may include information such asan occurrence ranking, a detection ranking, and a severity ranking.While this information (the occurrence, detection, and severityrankings) may be taken into account to calculate the RPN of the finalevent 102, one of skill in the art will appreciate that this informationmay be propagated via “upward” and “downward” inheritance in betweenevents 102 prior to doing so.

For instance, information such as occurrence and detection ranking of anevent 102 likely uses “upward” inheritance, flowing from an event 102that is lower in the hierarchy to one or more higher level events 102.However, the severity of failure by a lower level event 102 likely isnot known until “downward” inheritance is used, and the severityinformation is inherited by the lower-level event 102 from thehigher-level events 102. In other words, severity ranking of a lowerlevel event 102 is inherited from the top event 102, and propagated toeverything below the top event 102. For example, occurrence anddetection ranking of event 122 b is likely propagated “upward” to event122, then to event 120, and finally to event 150. However, the severityof this failure is likely “downward” inherited, where event 150 sendsinformation to its lower events 120, 130, 140, thus down to events 122,124, and 126, and thus from event 122 down to events 122 a and 122 b.Upon all of this information being propagated in appropriate directions,an RPN for each event 102 and propagation lines 104 a-c may becalculated.

As discussed above, the program may also have the capability to“override” some of the propagation, as accomplished by overrideindicator 108. This may be used when more information is known about aparticular mid-level event 102 (e.g., event 122) than the lower-levelevents 102 (e.g., 122 a and 122 b). While lower-level events 122 a and122 b may be included for completeness of the entire system, little maybe known about the component or what may cause the component to fail,thus causing incorrect calculations and an incorrect FMEA if taken intoaccount. Therefore, event 122 may be configured to “override” itsdefault output with alternative user-input constants or other programmedcalculations, as dictated by the override indicator 108.

As discussed in more detail in FIGS. 2A and 2B, cause and effect map 100may also visually reflect risk to the user by altering, for example, theborder thickness for particular events 102, the thickness of one or morepropagation lines 104 a-c, or the corresponding color of the affectedevents 102 and/or propagation lines 104 a-c.

The cause and effect map 100 may be generated using any variety ofprogramming languages such as, but not limited to, visual basic.Further, with respect to cause and effect map 100, any one of the events102 may represent a cause or effect event for a component, subsystem orsystem. Additionally, while cause and effect map 100 displays a causalevent (e.g., event 122 a) only propagating failure information to asingle effect event (e.g., event 122), one of skill in the art willappreciate that propagation from a causal event may lead to a pluralityof effect events, without departing from the scope of the disclosure.

Referring now to FIGS. 2A and 2B, with continued reference to FIG. 1,illustrated is an exemplary cause and effect map 200 encompassingexemplary FMEA and risk, according to one or more embodiments. Cause andeffect map 200 is substantially similar to cause and effect map 100(FIG. 1), and may therefore be best understood with reference thereto.Similar to cause and effect map 100 of FIG. 1, cause and effect map 200may include a plurality of events 102, depicted herein as events 220,222, 224, 222 a, and 222 b. Again, as will be discussed in greaterdetail below with reference to FIG. 3, a user may input or edit eventinformation via one or more graphical user interfaces. Each event 102may be interconnected with corresponding propagation lines 204 a-c thatillustrate or otherwise facilitate information propagating betweenevents adjacent 102.

FIG. 2A and FIG. 2B illustrate an embodiment of visually distinguishingrisk in a cause and effect map due to varying information of one or moreevents 102. Examples of these visual differences include changing theborder thickness for a particular event 102, thickness of one or morepropagation lines 204 a-c, and coloring effects of both the borders of aparticular event 102 and/or one or more propagation lines 204 a-c. Aswill be appreciated, such visual representations and changes quickly andeasily display degrees of risk to the user and/or engineers referencingthe map 200.

In one embodiment, the border thickness of an event 102 may vary due toa particular occurrence rating assigned to events 102. For example, theoccurrence rating for a particular event 102 may be predefined, such asby allowing a user to assign a value ranging from 1 to 5 to such anevent 102. When said event 102 has a low failure occurrence, the usermay assign a value of 1 for the occurrence rating for that event 102. Asa result, the border for said event 102 may be thinned or otherwise lessbold than adjacent events, thereby indicating to a user that the event102 exhibits a low occurrence rating. However, when a particular event102 has a high failure occurrence, the user may assign a value of 5 forthe occurrence rating of that event 102. As a result, the border forsaid event may be made thicker or bolder than adjacent events, such asis depicted with events 222 b, 222, and 220 in FIG. 2B.

Where a user inputs a high value for detection ranking of an event 102,meaning that there is a lower likelihood of detecting a failure for thatevent 102, the thickness of the corresponding propagation lines 204 a-cmay also be changed or otherwise vary. For example, in FIG. 2A, if thedetection ranking for event 222 b has a low value, propagation line 204b may be thin. Following previously discussed “upward” inheritance, thislow detection ranking is inherited by event 222, and the resultingpropagation line 204 c may also be depicted as thin. However, as seen inFIG. 2B, if the detection ranking for event 222 b has a high value(meaning that there is a low likelihood of detecting a failure),propagation line 204 b may be thick. Thus, again, following “upward”inheritance, this high detection ranking is inherited by event 222, andthe resulting propagation line 204 c may also be thick. This clearlyindicates to the user that the system has a poor detection of a certainfault, but also outlines the path to which event 102 may be the rooterror.

In a further embodiment, the graphically displayed color of a particularevent 102 and/or a corresponding propagation line 204 a-c may change dueto the RPN calculated for an event 102. As previously discussed, onemethod of calculating the RPN for an event 102 may be to multiply theseverity ranking, the occurrence ranking, and/or the detection rankingof the event 102. In one embodiment, a low RPN number could be displayedon a gradually changing and blended color scale where, for example, blueor green represent low risk. As the RPN for an event 102 increases(i.e., greater risk of failure), this color map may blend into yellow ororange, for instance. When the RPN is great (i.e., indicating high riskof failure), the color for the particular event 102 and correspondingpropagation line 204 a-c may indicate dark orange or red.

As will be appreciated, such color changes may be applied to any part ofthe cause and effect map 200 including, but not limited to, the borderor shading of an event 102 and the color of a propagation line 204 a-c.As an example, if the RPN for event 222 a in FIG. 2B is low, the borderof event 222 a may be green or yellow. Further, the correspondingpropagation line 204 a may inherit this RPN value and also change itscolor to green or yellow. However, if the RPN for event 222 b is high,the border of event 222 b may be changed to orange or red and thecorresponding propagation line 204 b may likewise be changed to orangeor red.

Referring now to FIG. 3, with continued reference to FIG. 1 and FIGS. 2Aand 2B, illustrated is an exemplary graphical user interface (GUI) 300for receiving and displaying information related to a causal event blockof a cause and effect map, according to one or more embodiments. In oneembodiment, the GUI 300 allows the user to assign and/or editinformation regarding events 102 (FIG. 1). Such a GUI 300 may allow auser to input or edit information for multiple fields, such as an eventblock name 302, an event severity ranking 304, an occurrence ranking306, a detection ranking 308, and a risk override enablement 310.

The GUI 300 may also allow a user to associate a specific event to acomponent, subsystem, system, component's function, subsystem's functionand system's function as stored in a database (discussed further in FIG.4). In addition to receiving or editing user input, the GUI 300 may alsodisplay information, such as the RPN 312, to the user. Such informationmay be obtained from memory or from a central database. All fields, bothinput and output, may be located on one or more tabs 314. In the presentexample, GUI 300 is associated with event 122 of FIG. 1, as displayed bythe information in the event block field 302. Further, the risk rankingoverride 310 has been selected, as also indicated by risk overrideindicator 108 (FIG. 1).

In another embodiment, the program may enable the user to search fordesired information within event blocks of the cause and effect map.This search may done through the same GUI 300 as users assign and/oredit information, such as having a tab 314 with various search optionsknown to those skilled in the art. Alternatively, a separate GUI (notshown) may be designed and used solely for search purposes. Uponsearching, the program may give the user various options for displayingsuch search results. For example, the program may allow easiervisualization of event blocks containing the information searched for byhighlighting one individual event that includes the information searchedfor. Additionally, the program may highlight all event blocks with theinformation searched for, without departing from the scope of thedisclosure.

One of skill in the art will appreciate that each event is not requiredto use a single individual GUI for user input. Rather, GUI's may bebuilt and used as requested by the user or suited for the specific eventbeing configured.

Referring now to FIG. 4, with continued reference to FIGS. 1-3,illustrated is a flow chart depicting a method 400 of creating andupdating a graphical representation of a cause and effect map, accordingto one or more embodiments. This method 400 may encompass the initialcreation of the cause and effect map or otherwise the undertaking ofvarious changes and/or updates to an existing cause and effect map.Notably, updates include both assigning and/or updating information viaa GUI (e.g., GUI 300 of FIG. 3), but also updating the cause and effectmap by creating or updating connections (e.g., propagation lines 104 a-cof FIG. 1) between event blocks.

At 402, a program receives input from a user via a GUI. In oneembodiment of the present disclosure, for initial creation of the visualcause and effect map, this may include placing down “blocks” from a userprogramming palette. These palette blocks, for example, may be itemssuch as events 102 (FIG. 1), propagation lines 104 a-c (FIG. 1), or arisk calculator 110 (FIG. 1). Upon placing down such blocks, a GUI(e.g., GUI 300 of FIG. 3) may then be displayed to the user for input ofvarious points of information. Such information may include assigningthe event block to a pre-defined component or subsystem stored in adatabase (i.e., assigning the event block to a “function”).Alternatively, manual input alone may be appropriate, for example, whenusing risk override functionality for an event block.

If a cause and effect map is already built, the GUI may allow the userto update information already forming part of the cause and effect map.Further, as briefly stated, one of skill in the art will appreciate that“creating” or “updating” the cause and effect map also includesconnecting events together (or altering event connections) via visualpropagation lines (e.g., propagation lines 104 a-c of FIG. 1).

At 404, upon input or alteration of information, the program may storethe information, possibly in a memory or a database, and then calculateor re-calculate risk. For example, as previously discussed, the RPN ofan event may be calculated by multiplying the severity ranking,occurrence ranking, and detection ranking of that event 102. Thus, ifthe severity, occurrence, or detection rankings are changed by a user,the RPN will need to be re-calculated.

These calculations may occur on-the-fly, such that the programimmediately reflects such calculation to the user (for example,reflected in RPN display 312 (FIG. 3)). Alternatively, the program mayrecalculate risk upon completion of all information and exiting from theinput GUI. One of skill in the art will appreciate that any calculationdiscussed herein need not be automatically reflected. A user may preferto manually control when re-calculations are performed due to very largecause and effect maps possibly requiring lengthy calculation andprocessing times.

At 406, upon completion of risk or FMEA calculations, the information isthen displayed to the user via a visually updated cause and effect map.In one embodiment, similar to visual representations discussed in FIG.2, this may include updating the cause and effect map to reflectappropriate event border or propagation line thicknesses, and associatedcolor update reflecting risk (RPN).

At 408, the information stored in the database may be output to one ormore peripheral programs or devices. For example, the program may outputthe cause and effect map to a monitor for the user to view and consider.Alternatively, the cause and effect map may be sent to a printer or thelike. In one embodiment, the cause and effect map information may beoutput in a spreadsheet format (further discussed in FIGS. 5A and 5B,below). This format may be custom to the user's needs, or built toreflect industry standards. Alternatively, the program may outputinformation in such a format as to be used or processed by otherdatabases, for example xFMEA.

It will be appreciated that the foregoing method 400 is merely oneembodiment of the present disclosure and should not be considered aslimiting or all inclusive of events that may or must take place.Moreover, the order of steps or blocks in the method 400 need not beprecisely followed. Indeed, assigning information, performingcalculations, and displaying information may be performed in a varietyof steps, orders, or repetitions, and as best suited for the user'sneeds.

Referring now to FIGS. 5A and 5B, with continued reference to FIGS. 1-4,illustrated is an exemplary cause and effect map 500 and correspondingFMEA worksheet 530, according to one or more embodiments. Moreparticularly, the exemplary FMEA worksheet 530 of FIG. 5B may beautomatically generated as based on the graphical cause and effect map500 of FIG. 5A. Moreover, the FMEA worksheet 530 may include orotherwise depict function assignments of various causal event blocksderived from FIG. 5A.

The cause and effect map 500 of FIG. 5A includes multiple events 102 andpropagation lines 504 with characteristics identical to that of causeand effect map 100 of FIG. 1. Cause and effect map 500 is merely asmaller cause and effect map as compared to cause and effect map 100,and is illustrated to facilitate discussion of its transformation intothe FMEA spreadsheet 530 of FIG. 5B. Cause and effect map 500 contains aplurality of failure events 102, including events 510, 520, 522, 522 a,and 522 b. Certain failure events visually depict an associatedsubsystem. For example, failure of subsystem 524 will cause event 520.Subsystem 526 is illustrated as having multiple independent instances. Afirst instance of subsystem 526 is associated with event 522 a, and asecond instance of subsystem 526 is associated with event 522 b. Aspreviously discussed, this association may have been performed by a uservia a GUI such as GUI 300 (FIG. 3). In cause and effect map 500, similarto cause and effect map 100, events 510, 520, 522, 522 a, and 522 b maybe interconnected via propagation lines 504 that are substantiallysimilar in form and function to propagation lines 104 a-c of FIG. 1.

In FIG. 5B, spreadsheet 530 illustrates part of an exemplary FMEAspreadsheet programmatically generated from cause and effect map 500.The spreadsheet 530 may contain information such as function name,failure mode, the effects of a failure (“Effects”), causes of a failure(“Causes”), and the severity ranking, occurrence ranking, detectionranking, and RPN of a particular event. In one embodiment, the programmay generate the spreadsheet 530 by using the function assignments madeby the user for cause and effect map 500. As previously discussed, eachevent may be associated with a subsystem (the subsystem possiblyimplemented and referred to as a “function” for programming purposes).In spreadsheet 530, function names used correspond to subsystems theyrepresent. Thus, function name “Subsystem 524” corresponds to subsystem524 (FIG. 5A). Accordingly, “Failure Mode” (FIG. 5B) for functionSubsystem 524 is event 520. Similarly, function name “Subsystem 526”(FIG. 5B) corresponds to subsystem 526 (FIG. 5A), and spreadsheet 530contains a row for each associated event, 522 a, 522 b.

Spreadsheet 530 illustrates, for example, both the cause and effects forevent 520 in FIG. 5A. Spreadsheet 530 illustrates that subsystem 524 maycause failure event 520 if there is a causal event of 522 (FIG. 5A).Further, spreadsheet 530 illustrates that event 520 will result in aneffect event of 510. Additionally, spreadsheet 530 illustrates possiblecausal strings of event 520. Specifically, a cause may be event 522.Further, event 522 may have been caused by event 522 a. Alternatively,event 522 may have been caused by event 522 b.

Spreadsheet 530 also illustrates the cause and effects for event 522 aand event 522 b. Events 522 a and 522 b are illustrated in spreadsheet530 as failure modes to subsystem 526. However, the “causes” column ofspreadsheet 530 is blank for event 522 a and event 522 b, illustratingthat these may be the lowest resolution of cause as depicted by thecause and effect map in FIG. 5A. In one embodiment, this may also signalevents 522 a and 522 b to be actionable root causes.

In another embodiment, spreadsheet 530 may also illustrate the result ofrisk ranking inheritance from the cause and effect map. In spreadsheet530, the column “severity ranking” illustrates that the severity riskranking of an event 102 is equal to the last effect event 102. Forexample, in FIG. 5A, all events 102 lead to end effect event 510. Thisis reflected in spreadsheet 530 (FIG. 5B) as the severity of event 510(“Sev. Of 510”) is listed in the Severity Ranking column for allfunctions. In cases where there are more than one end effect (notshown), the highest severity will be used. Spreadsheet 530 alsoillustrates that occurrence and detection ranking is equal to the lowestevent of the cause and effect map 500. Thus, in spreadsheet 530, thereare no causes listed in the “causes” column for events 522 a and 522 b,and the Occurrence Ranking and Detection Ranking columns have inheritedinformation equal to the event listed in the column “Failure Mode”.

Referring now to FIG. 6, illustrated is a schematic diagram of anexemplary computer system 600 in which the present disclosure may beimplemented, according to one or more embodiments. The computer system600 may include a bus 602, a processor/controller 604, a non-transitorymachine-readable medium (i.e., a memory) 606, a computer program 608,one or more databases 610, and one or more peripheral devices 612.

The bus 602 may provide electrical conductivity and a communicationpathway among the various components of the computer system 600. Theprocessor 604 may be configured to execute one or more sequences ofinstructions, programming stances, or code stored on a non-transitorycomputer-readable medium, such as the memory 606. The processor 604 canbe, for example, a general purpose microprocessor, a microcontroller, adigital signal processor, an application specific integrated circuit, afield programmable gate array, a programmable logic device, acontroller, a state machine, a gated logic, discrete hardwarecomponents, an artificial neural network, or any like suitable entitythat can perform calculations or other manipulations of data.

As used herein, a machine-readable medium (i.e., a memory) 606, refersto any medium that directly or indirectly provides instructions to aprocessor for execution. A machine-readable medium can take on manyforms including, for example, non-volatile media, volatile media, andtransmission media. Non-volatile media can include, for example, opticaland magnetic disks. Volatile media can include, for example, dynamicmemory. Common forms of machine-readable media can include, for example,floppy disks, flexible disks, hard disks, magnetic tapes, other likemagnetic media, CD-ROMs, DVDs, other like optical media, punch cards,paper tapes and like physical media with patterned holes, RAM, ROM,PROM, EPROM and flash EPROM.

The computer program 608 may be a set of executable sequences programmedto carry out the functions described above in generating, populating,and otherwise displaying the maps, spreadsheets, etc. Executablesequences described herein can be implemented with one or more sequencesof code contained in a memory. In some embodiments, such code can beread into the memory 606 from another machine-readable medium. Executionof the sequences of instructions contained in the memory can cause aprocessor to perform the process steps described herein. One or moreprocessors in a multi-processing arrangement can also be employed toexecute instruction sequences in the memory. In addition, hard-wiredcircuitry can be used in place of or in combination with softwareinstructions to implement various embodiments described herein. Thus,the present embodiments are not limited to any specific combination ofhardware and/or software.

The computer program may communicate with a database 610 to store orretrieve information. The computer program may also implement use ofperipheral devices 612. Such peripheral devices may include formsallowing user input, such as a keyboard, mouse, or touchscreen.Peripheral devices may also include output devices, such as a monitor,printer, or additional storage memory. Further, peripheral devices alsoinclude other computer systems or programs that may interact withcomputer system 600.

In some embodiments, computer hardware can further include elements suchas, for example, a memory (e.g., random access memory (RAM), flashmemory, read only memory (ROM), programmable read only memory (PROM),electrically erasable programmable read only memory (EEPROM)),registers, hard disks, removable disks, CD-ROMS, DVDs, or any other likesuitable storage device or medium.

Therefore, the disclosed systems and methods are well adapted to attainthe ends and advantages mentioned as well as those that are inherenttherein. The particular embodiments disclosed above are illustrativeonly, as the teachings of the present disclosure may be modified andpracticed in different but equivalent manners apparent to those skilledin the art having the benefit of the teachings herein. Furthermore, nolimitations are intended to the details of construction or design hereinshown, other than as described in the claims below. It is thereforeevident that the particular illustrative embodiments disclosed above maybe altered, combined, or modified and all such variations are consideredwithin the scope and spirit of the present disclosure. The systems andmethods illustratively disclosed herein may suitably be practiced in theabsence of any element that is not specifically disclosed herein and/orany optional element disclosed herein. While compositions and methodsare described in terms of “comprising,” “containing,” or “including”various components or steps, the compositions and methods can also“consist essentially of” or “consist of” the various components andsteps. All numbers and ranges disclosed above may vary by some amount.Whenever a numerical range with a lower limit and an upper limit isdisclosed, any number and any included range falling within the range isspecifically disclosed. In particular, every range of values (of theform, “from about a to about b,” or, equivalently, “from approximately ato b,” or, equivalently, “from approximately a-b”) disclosed herein isto be understood to set forth every number and range encompassed withinthe broader range of values. Also, the terms in the claims have theirplain, ordinary meaning unless otherwise explicitly and clearly definedby the patentee. Moreover, the indefinite articles “a” or “an,” as usedin the claims, are defined herein to mean one or more than one of theelement that it introduces. If there is any conflict in the usages of aword or term in this specification and one or more patent or otherdocuments that may be incorporated herein by reference, the definitionsthat are consistent with this specification should be adopted.

The invention claimed is:
 1. A method, comprising: populating andgenerating a cause and effect map via a graphical user interface, thecause and effect map having a plurality of events at multiple levels ofhierarchy and interconnected with one or more propagation lines, and atleast one of the plurality of events being associated with one or morepotential failures of a component or subsystem of a system; performing afailure mode effects analysis (FMEA) on the cause and effect map;graphically depicting the cause and effect map to reflect risk based onthe FMEA; and visually distinguishing a first event at a level ofhierarchy from a second event at the level of hierarchy to displaydifferent degrees of risk associated with the first and second events.2. The method of claim 1, wherein visually distinguishing the firstevent from the second event comprises varying a color of one of thefirst and second events.
 3. The method of claim 1, wherein visuallydistinguishing the first event from the second event comprises varying aborder thickness of one of the first and second events.
 4. The method ofclaim 1, wherein visually distinguishing the first event from the secondevent comprises varying a color of the propagation lines associated withone of the first and second events.
 5. The method of claim 1, whereinvisually distinguishing the first event from the second event comprisesvarying a thickness of the propagation lines associated with one of thefirst and second events.
 6. The method of claim 1, further comprisingstoring the cause and effect map information in a database associatedwith the system.
 7. The method of claim 1, further comprising searchingthe cause and effect map for desired information.
 8. The method of claim1, further comprising using data derived from the cause and effect mapby a third-party program.
 9. The method of claim 1, further comprisinggenerating a representation of the cause and effect map in the form ofan FMEA spreadsheet.
 10. The method of claim 9, wherein the FMEAspreadsheet comprises a list of possible causes and a list of possiblefurther failures for at least one of the plurality of events.
 11. Themethod of claim 1, further comprising overriding an event output from atleast one of the plurality of events using alternative user-inputconstants or programmed calculations.
 12. The method of claim 1, furthercomprising selectively passing data to at least one effect event of theplurality of events by applying a weighted formula to the data.
 13. Themethod of claim 1, further comprising modifying the cause and effect mapby inputting alternative or additional information.
 14. A non-transitorycomputer readable medium including computer-readable instructions storedthereon which, when executed by a processor, configure the processor toperform functions including: generating a cause and effect map populatedvia a graphical user interface, the cause and effect map having aplurality of events at multiple levels of hierarchy and interconnectedwith one or more propagation lines, at least one of the plurality ofevent being associated with one or more potential failures of acomponent or subsystem; performing a failure mode effects analysis(FMEA) on the cause and effect map; graphically depicting the cause andeffect map to reflect risk based on the FMEA; and visuallydistinguishing a first event at a level of hierarchy from a second eventat the level of hierarchy to display different degrees of riskassociated with the first and second events.
 15. The non-transitorycomputer readable medium of claim 14, wherein visually distinguishingthe first event from the second event comprises at least one of varyinga color of one of the first and second events, and varying a borderthickness of one of the first and second events.
 16. The non-transitorycomputer readable medium of claim 14, wherein visually distinguishingthe first event from the second event comprises at least one of varyinga color of the propagation lines associated with one of the first andsecond events, and varying a thickness of the propagation linesassociated with one of the first and second events.
 17. Thenon-transitory computer readable medium of claim 14, further comprisingsearching the cause and effect map for desired information.
 18. Thenon-transitory computer readable medium of claim 14, further comprisinggenerating a representation of the cause and effect map in the form ofan FMEA spreadsheet, the FMEA spreadsheet comprising a list of possiblecauses and a list of possible further failures for at least one of theplurality of events.
 19. The non-transitory computer readable medium ofclaim 14, further comprising overriding an event output from at leastone of the plurality of events using alternative programmedcalculations.
 20. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim14, further comprising selectively passing data to at least one effectevent of the plurality of events by applying a weighted formula to thedata.